Hookswitch mechanisms are of course well-known in the telephone arts and may be traced back to the very early 1900's, as for example U.S. Pat. No. 982,213 issued Jan. 17, 1911. In the telephones in use in the 1940's and still in use at this time, plunger type hookswitches are frequently located between the tines of the telephone cradle. For examples see U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,199,686 to Beyland issued May 7, 1940 and 2,273,530 issued Feb. 17, 1942 to D. King. In these telephones, the plunger acted on one arm of a bell crank to pivot the bell crank and operate a leaf spring pileup. Pivotal cradles are also known. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,440,366 issued to Samios on Apr. 22, 1967, a pivotal cradle is shown as pivoting a lever arm to operate leaf spring contacts. Later, U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,818,150 issued to Kunimine on June 18, 1974 and 3,903,070 issued to Kunimine et al on Sept. 2, 1975 showed pivotal cradles, the cradles acting through a translatory comb to operate leaf spring contacts.
Plunger operated switches are also known in other electrical arts such as the vacuum cleaner switch shown by U.S. Pat. No. 3,867,591 issued Feb. 18, 1975 to Nordeen.